Minimarg the MOST Beautiful Place in PAKISTAN EP.07 | North Pakistan Motorcycle Tour
That's Chilam Chowki in front of us. You need to have your passes in your hand. One of our friends is over there. He has the passes. This place is truly amazing. Ali is also here for the first time. Let's park here.
Look at how that road is making its way through the mountains. I'm in love with this valley. You must have heard a lot of praise about this.
Assalam Alekum. Good Morning. Namaste. Sat Sri Akal to everyone. From Chilam Chowki. We got here last evening. The place where we stayed last night is called Ghazi Guest House. This place and the one up there are two decent places here. These are good places for night stay.
But Chilam Chowki is not really a tourist spot. People going to Deosai just spend a night here as intermediate stop. That also includes the tourists to Minimarg. So, we are gonna visit Minimarg today.
That has been in my bucket list for a really long time now. I was here in 2020 but I wasn't allowed to go any further. Because, those were Covid days. It was not open for public and you had to seek permission. But this time we do have the permission.
And more importantly, it is now open for public. Let's get down there and start our ride. We look forward to spending our night in Minimarg.
We'll keep on sharing all the details with you. We also have Yasir with us, who is busy making his videos. That's his motorcycle.
And that's our friend Ali, who's all ready to start. And so is his motorcycle. You can also see my motorcycle behind me. Lets get going and show you Minimarg. Okay Hamid... Thanks very much.
Bismillah... In the name of Allah... *Prayer for the journey* We pray to Allah for a smooth and memorable ride ahead. I'm really excited to see Minimarg. I hope we won't face any problem today. At this point, let me say that, Hamid from Ghazi Guest House is a thorough gentleman.
People here are working really hard. So if you come here, do keep in mind the circumstances here. It's not easy to leave the comfort of your house and come to a remote place like this to provide services to tourists. Really nice people indeed. That's Chilam Chowki in front of us. Looks really crowded though.
I hope they would let us through although we are a bit late. Yeah... we have to get ourselves registered here. Since we plan to spend our night there...
It's almost a 4 hour ride so we thought to leave comfortably around 10 am. Assalam Alekum Alright See how crowded this place is. So, our permission has been granted.
Got to meet so many people here. Time to leave now. Assalam Alekum Wa Alekum Salam Sir. How are you? You need to have your passes in your hands. Our passes are with our friend who is over there. You'll have to get all three motorcycles through at the same time. So you need to show it over there.
Okay Sir. Thanks very much. Allah Hafiz Our beloved brothers in Army are giving us really good protocol this time. They recognized us immediately.
And our whole permission procedure was cleared in under 15 minutes. We have given our pass to Ali. He'll be leading us. You show your passes here and the guys here confirm it by calling the previous post.
So, there are still some restrictions but it's okay if you have the pass. Okay then. Allah Hafiz They have taken our passes here.
So, you have to get a pass at the previous point and give it at the entry point. And this marks the start of our journey towards Minimarg. Lets see how the road here looks like. Is it an off road or whatever... But one thing is for sure.
The beauty of nature that we are seeing at the first curve, is only gonna get much better. And we are gonna enjoy ourselves in Minimarg. It has been a restricted area for a very long time. And now when it's open, every tourist wants to visit Minimarg. That's why there are so many people here these days.
Especially on Eid holidays, or any other holiday or on weekends... Then there are even more tourists here. My recommendation would be to avoid coming here on those days.
I'd like to add one thing at this point. Only motorcycles bigger than 150 cc are allowed to come here. Other than that, only 4x4 vehicles. No other vehicle is allowed. And I do understand the reason behind it after looking at the condition of the road.
Even though it's still not too bad. But as we'll proceed and come across water crossings... Then we'll get an even better idea. Anyways, the place has a very raw sense of beauty. And the rays of sunlight making their way through the clouds... That's making its beauty increase manifold.
You can say that it's probably the best season .... To ride, make videos and ... Look at that beautiful water spring down there. We can still see snow at the top of these mountains. Every curve is bringing us face to face with a wonderful scene.
Sometimes I feel like turning off my camera... But then I feel the need to turn the camera back on again. Look at that awesome view of Burzil Top. These peaks are completely covered with snow.
I think we'll be covering about 3 thousand feet altitude. Back there the altitude was almost 11 thousand feet. And we are going to a place with an altitude of 13 to 14 thousand feet. You'll also see tents of locals in this section. Because they bring their cattle here due to how grassy this landscape is. Locals don't need any permission though.
That's only for the tourists. Another way in which this area is different from others is... I mean why the people are all praise about this place... You won't see so much greenery in the mountains of Skardu. That would only be in the valley. The situation is not very different if you are coming from Astore side.
Then there is Deosai that is all green. Then, the level lower than Deosai is the Neelum valley. In my opinion, Minimarg is between the two.
What do you think Ali? So, the most unique thing here that you won't see anywhere else is this landscape. I'll also show you how close this region is from the Line of Control. I'll have to check Google Maps for exact information. There's another check post coming.
Ali, please come forward as you have the pass. O... we have already given the passes. So we'll just be showing our ID cards here. Here I'm getting the same feeling that you get in Gitti Das when you are coming down from Babusar Top.
I mean a river flowing across a lush green valley... And you are coming down from a pass. I don't think we'll be stopped here.
Assalam Alekum This place is really wonderful. Ali is here for the first time and so am I. Yasir was here last year as well. The road in this section is comparatively better.
Riding here makes me feel as if I'm traveling through some European country. Especially Norway. Because I really like Norway. This weather is quite similar to the weather there during summers. And these beautiful mountains are also very similar.
This area seems to be very well maintained. Since there are not too many tourists here, you won't see any garbage around. But the raw beauty that you see here, you won't see this in Europe. Every area there is very well maintained. I don't think you will find any adventure there.
If you leave in the morning, you'll easily get to any place by the evening. But here, you are never certain. There could be a landslide anywhere. And we could get stuck there. The snowfall may also start as we reach Burzil Top.
You can see the glaciers on our sides as well. The temperature here must be around 3 or 4 degrees. I mean I do feel cold while riding. My hands are also feeling the cold. Because I'm wearing summer gloves. Since we are ascending the Burzil Top...
and since this area is under Army control... this road till Burzil Top is in very good condition. I think we are in the middle of the Burzil Top. Another couple of curves to go...
The top is completely covered with snow. Over there is the snow covered Burzil Top. Whereas the area over this side is Deosai region.
I think the mountains on the other side are from the Deosai planes. And we are riding along them right now. There's another way to Minimarg that is from Deosai.
We'll see the condition of that road when we get there. We'd like to enter from there if we get the permission. That would be a rather unique experience for us. Because no one has covered that area before. But that depends on whether we get the permission or not.
Until then, you keep enjoying this wonderful sight. And this is Burzil Top. Only one more ascend to go. Over here, there is just snow all around us. You can take a look at the whole valley from here.
We have gained a considerable amount of altitude. There's a check post of Pakistan Army at Burzil Top. We may have to stop here to get ourselves registered.
But it's really cold up here. Let's park here. We stopped here for only a short while. And you start getting an idea about the altitude here. You feel the exertion no matter what you do.
We got ourselves registered here. We are now gonna descend down this pass gradually. The scenery here is as awesome as the one we left behind. This is the beginning of the peak season here. That's why there's so much snow here.
But I feel that the snow is only increasing the beauty of this place. There's not much greenery up here due to extremely high altitude. But the whole area down there is green.
The areas without snow, I mean. It was very cold at the top. I could not stand there for more than 5 minutes or so. It took hardly 30 to 35 minutes to reach the pass. Not more than that. We did take a break in the middle, so I am not including it in the time.
Simply amazing See how beautifully that road is making its way through the mountains. These mountains are not too high but their shape is really beautiful. Check out how beautiful this lake is. Not a big one though.
It looked even smaller from a distance. But as we came closer, we see that it's not too small after all. Ali, I think these jeeps are the local transport coming from Deosai.
We just talked to a jeep driver. He told us that the Barra Pani, which is a stop in Deosi... Many of you who have visited Deosai must know about it.
So, he told us that there is a road from here to that point. We think that now we are gonna drop altitude to go down. That's a very green area. Here you can see that there is a lot of snow on the mountains.
You are gonna see a completely different landscape down there. There's so much variation on this track. And probably this is the most special thing about this valley.
We are on our way down, now. I'm gonna show you a stunning view in a second. Check this out... Ain't that amazing... Let me stop here for a while and show you this. We have to go along this zigzag path to go down. That's the Minimarg valley.
And then there will be Dumail and other lakes... Our downhill ride from the pass has now begun. As soon as we come down the pass, there is another check post.
And you have to get registered there as well. There's a check post at almost every important point here. Assalam Alekum We are now on off road. I think the toughest section was there by the pass and that has been constructed.
And the rest of it is still to be constructed. However, I don't think it would be any problem for the motorcycle. One can have a rather enjoyable ride here. As a matter of fact, I like such roads. If you have a scenery like this, you ride slowly to enjoy it. Otherwise, you tend to keep going fast.
Not to forget the awesome water springs and water crossings that you see here. Such as adventure has a charm of its own. I'm in love with this valley. I'm sure when you'll watch this video...
I hope we are doing a good job too. And that will surely boost the tourism here. However, increased tourism has its downside as well. You can see how clean and pristine this valley is right now.
There's no garbage or litter here. That's because of a low tourist number. Hopefully, if there's a rise in the tourism in this region in the years to come... which will definitely be a good thing for the local businesses... I hope that it will still be as clean and beautiful as it is right now. .
So that our future generations also get to enjoy such a wonderful place. Look at that water stream coming down that glacier. How awesome is that... Wherever you go, every corner has something new for you.
Check this out. How serene the whole valley looks from here. The weather is great today and the light is very soft. I'm sure that will be really beneficial to the video quality. Assalam Alekum The road to Domail is from here... Almost 15 km from here.
Here's a water crossing. So... this village is called Minimarg. Whenever we talk about this area, this is the village that we talk about.
However, there are many other villages in this area. So, we are not staying in Minimarg. We are going ahead towards Domail. There's a tent village there, where we'll be spending our night. We have been told that that area is even more beautiful. In my opinion, our journey so far... You can't say that this area is any less beautiful.
This area is really awesome. I think we'll see more greenery as we go further down. So you come down to Minimarg... And then the road starts going up hill again. I'm not sure if we'll actually be gaining some altitude.
I mean we are still going up hill but I don't know about that village. There's a considerable population here. I mean we are in front of a village after leaving two villages behind us. These villagers have really small and simple houses. Wow... This road is really adventurous. This is also a bigger stream.
There are a lot of rocks in here. That's why you have to be on your guard all the time. Anyways, we are through. Is this the village or the tourist point in Domail? I think this is the local village.
These are some huge trucks. This is the parking of Rainbow Lake. This is the famous Rainbow Lake. No doubt, when you come here, you get amazed by its beauty and the color of its water. How pristine this lake is, actually make everyone praise it so much.
This is probably one of the most beautiful lakes in Pakistan. Not to forget the wonderful view of mountains in the backdrop. Let me tell you that this area is closed at 5 pm. The tourists who are here for a day trip are asked to start leaving by 3.30 pm. Since we are here for the night stay, we'll just sit here and enjoy this area.
Afterwards, we'll go to the camp site. Beside the Rainbow Lake, there is another lake here called the Crystal Lake. This is the main tourist spot here. Not just this lake is beautiful but also the beautiful green grass on its shores...
Also there are patches of snow on the mountains... I don't remember having seen such beauty anywhere else in Pakistan. And the whole thing is really well maintained. What's your name? Kotwal is in Haramosh. I am from that area. Oh nice. We are also going to Haramosh valley.
If you go that, I'll give you someone who can show you the whole area. Sure. Thank you, Farman. We have finally got a tent here that I'll show you now. It's a very spacious tent and 3 to 4 people can comfortably sleep in it.
The charges are PKR 1500 per person. I did try my best to get permission to use our own tents since we have them. Would be nice to have your own tent, a little away from this camp site, by the riverside. Because this is such a beautiful location. I also wanted to stay in my tent as it may be a bit loud here at night due to other tourists. That would definitely be more comfortable.
But they told us that they have strict instructions from the Army. One must use only these tents. Using your own tents is not allowed. So, we thought to take what's being offered. Do try to book your tent before you come here.
Our dinner has been served. This is mutton karahi. Yasir has lentils in front of him. Don't you wanna have mutton? No, I will have mutton. We didn't eat anything after the breakfast so we are very hungry.
Anyways, today was one of the best riding days for us. Hopefully you must have loved this vlog. We worked really hard for it. If you did, don't forget to Like, Subscribe and Share. We are gonna have our dinner now. We'll take your leave now. Allah Hafiz
Don't want our roti to get cold... It's really cold here.
2023-08-19 17:27
